


Shifts

by katayla



Category: Bones
Genre: F/M, Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-03-18
Updated: 2009-03-18
Packaged: 2017-10-04 18:58:18
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,793
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/33074
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/katayla/pseuds/katayla
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Booth and Brennan start a relationship.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Shifts

The first thing Brennan said after the first time she slept with Booth was "We can't tell anyone."

"That bad, huh?"

"Not at all! It was quite good, especially considering it was the first time we had sex and--" she broke off when she saw Booth's grin. Years of partnership had taught her to read at least one man.

Booth had been lying on his back, but turned onto his side to face her, and took her hand. He had always been physical with her, but this felt different. She knew there was an anthropological significance to this, something she had studied, something she would've once told him, but now she let it pass.

"You think they'll split us up," he said.

"Yes. You know they will."

And now Booth rolled back, still holding her hand. They were in his apartment. She would have thought, if she thought about such things, that their first time would be at her place. This, too, had meaning, but it was the kind of meaning Angela was better at interpreting.

"It's none of their business," he finally said.

"We can't tell the team, either."

"We can't tell anyone."

"Then we're agreed."

At Booth's nod, she sat up and started reaching for her clothes.

"What are you doing?"

"I'm getting dressed."

"Why?"

"Booth, while some societies embrace nudity, this isn't one of them and if I went outside--"

"Stay."

"I can't. Not if we want to keep this quiet."

"Yes, you can." Booth tugged on her hand. "Come on, Bones. No one's going to know where you spent the night."

"Booth, there is no reason for me to stay."

"Yes, there is." He smiled at her, and this time ,when he squeezed her hand, she let him pull her all the way down. And it meant something, too, that she allowed him to convince her without demanding to know what the reason was.

It was a new kind of closeness, sleeping next to Booth. Hearing him breathe in the dark. They had occasionally shared sleeping spaces on stakeouts or when undercover, but not like this, with his bare chest so near to her and their legs touching.

In the morning, he smiled at her and it was the same smile as always. She assumed he'd be awkward, but he just kissed her on the forehead, and told her he'd see her at work.

***

When Booth arrived at the Jeffersonian, he greeted her with a "Morning, Bones," as if he hadn't said the same thing to her hours before.

"Good morning, Booth," she said, and nobody around them seemed to notice any difference in the exchange,

As soon as they were alone in her office, Booth started grinning.

"Stop it."

"What?"

"You look happy."

"I'm allowed to look happy, Bones. In fact, I _am_ happy. Aren't you?"

Brennan looked at her partner, his dark eyes intent on her own, and smiled before she could stop herself. "Yes."

"Good."

"But we're not allowed to be! That goes against all the rules."

"Maybe we should be rebels," Booth said, coming to sit on the edge of her desk. "Maybe they wouldn't split us up."

"They already made us go to counseling," Brennan said. "Do you really want to talk about this with Sweets?"

Booth raised his eyebrows. "Point taken." He tossed the file folder on her desk. "This case should keep us busy anyway. Read up!"

Brennan pulled the file toward her, but she had trouble focusing. Booth was watching her and she felt her cheeks growing hot. It was a simple physiological reaction, but not one she had expected to associate with Booth.

***

"I thought you'd be weirder about this," Brennan said in the car on the way to the crime scene.

"Weird about what?" Booth asked, glancing over at her.

"Sex," Brennan said. "You've always had such strange notions about it."

"Like what?"

Like that it should be emotional and not physical. Like it should have meaning. But she found she couldn't say any of those things out loud. For the first time in years, there were things she couldn't vocalize to Booth. She shrugged. "Maybe we should talk to Sweets about this, after all."

Booth raised his eyebrows. "You never want to talk to Sweets."

She shrugged again. Booth watched her for a while longer, but didn't say anything. Maybe there were things he couldn't say to her now, too.

***

That night, they spent the night at her place. It wasn't something they talked about. It just happened. He came over for take out and to discuss the case, but instead of going home, he stayed.

When she had men stay over, it was often uncomfortable. After she had sex with someone, she saw no need to prolong their contact. Booth was different. He'd spent so many hours in her apartment that having him sleep next to her wasn't such a big change after all.

***

As the weeks passed, Brennan grew more and more surprised that none of their friends picked up on the shift in their relationship. Despite her words to Booth, she had expected Angela to say something, or for Sweets to prod it out of them in one of their sessions. Instead, life continued as it always had. They worked on cases. Interns rotated in and out of the lab. And if occasionally Angela made a comment about her and Booth, it wasn't any different from the ones she had always made.

In fact, only one person had noticed.

Rebecca had dropped Parker off at Booth's apartment while Brennan was there. It happened often enough in the past that Rebecca didn't think anything of it. After hugging his mother goodbye, Parker ran into the living room and climbed onto the couch next to Brennan. "Hi, Bones!" he said.

"Hi, Parker."

"Are you catching bad guys?"

"Bad is an irrelevant term," Brennan said. "What your father and I do is pursue criminals, but even the definition of criminal differs from society to society and--"

"Bones," Booth said softly. He was leaning against the wall, and he looked relaxed in a way she'd never seen him before. All the tension he normally carried with him had melted away as he gazed at her and Parker, and she felt that something she couldn't name.

She looked down at Parker. "Yes, we're catching bad guys."

"Good," Parker said.

That night, as Booth was taking Parker to bed, he said, "Say good-night to Bones."

Parker came over to Brennan, hugged her and then asked, "Are you going to spend the night?"

Brennan looked over at Booth. They had been spending most nights together, but had decided that, for Parker's sake, she should sleep in her own bed. Booth just shrugged.

"Would that be okay with you?" Brennan asked.

Parker nodded. "Uh-huh. Night, Bones!"

Booth came out of Parker's room a couple of minutes later. "Well, that saves me a conversation," he said. He sat next to her and took her hand.

"I can still go."

"Stay," Booth said, and she put her head on his shoulder.

The next morning, he kissed her goodbye in front of Parker. Parker barely looked up from his cereal.

She was preoccupied the whole drive home. She'd once dated a man for three months without meeting his daughter. She'd known Parker for years. She wished, just for a second, that she could talk to Angela about this. But then she thought she knew what Angela would say.

***

She wasn't really surprised when, a couple of months later, Booth wanted to tell their friends. They were sitting on his couch, eating Chinese food. It was a rare lull between cases and they'd spent the entire weekend together.

"Don't you think they'll find out eventually?"

"Not necessarily," Brennan said. "Our personal and professional lives don't have to intersect."

"But they do," Booth said. "We can't ignore that."

Brennan didn't say anything. She liked the way things were. If more people knew, they would ask questions, push her in ways she didn't want to be pushed.

"Rebecca knows."

"You told her?"

"I think Parker said something."

Brennan sighed.

"She probably deserved to know," Booth said. "She tells me about her boyfriends."

Did that make her Booth's girlfriend? She wasn't sure she liked that label. She knew what being his partner meant, but girlfriend? That implied obligations she wasn't sure she could fulfill. She put her chopsticks down.

"I think we should tell them," Booth repeated.

Brennan shook her head. "We talked about this, Booth. The bureau will split us up."

"We don't know that," Booth said. "We make a good team. Sweets will stand up for us."

"No, Sweets will analyze us."

"He does that anyway." Now Booth put his food down, and looked at her. "And Angela is your best friend. Don't you feel guilty lying to her?"

"I'm not lying," Brennan said. "I'm just not sharing."

"Lying by omission," Booth said.

"Why do you care if they know?"

"Why don't you want them to know?"

He stared at her until she looked away, and she remembered how well he read people, especially her.

"We can't sneak around forever," Booth said.

"No," Brennan said. "Eventually we'll die."

She knew Booth was serious about this when he didn't respond. Bickering had always been the foundation of their relationship. It allowed them to ignore what they didn't want to acknowledge. In the past, they had both been complicit in this, letting things slide, pretending not to see what was there, but now Booth was refusing to follow the old pattern. It was as big a change as the sex had been.

He was asking her to bring everything they had always hidden out into the open. It wasn't telling their friends that bothered her, but what it would mean. Having people know would make this real. It would force all those conversations she'd been trying to avoid.

"It's none of their business," she said. She knew she was echoing Booth's words from months ago.

He seemed to remember, too, because he rubbed his hand across his mouth and picked up his food. He looked tired. She hadn't noticed that before.

She'd forgotten, without Angela and Sweets to remind her, that this kind of thing was hard on Booth. He'd feel a need to talk about this with his friends. It was for her sake that he was keeping quiet.

She reached over and took Booth's hand. "I'm scared," she said.

"I know," he said. "Come here." And he pulled her toward him, and put his arms around her.

She knew it was irrational, but when he held her like this, she felt like nothing could hurt her. She took a deep breath. "We can tell them."

"Thank you, Bones."


End file.
